Dark Assassin - Anne Perry [52]
“Good morning, Mrs. Applegate,” she replied. “No, I’m afraid there is little fresh so far.” She had nothing to lose by telling the truth. It was probably all lost anyway. “My husband learned a bit more about Mr. Havilland’s anxieties, but if Mary’s father found out anything precise, we do not know what it was. According to Mr. Sixsmith, who is in charge, he had something of an obsession about enclosed spaces and finally became quite irrational about it. Mr. Sixsmith said that was what finally unhinged his reason and brought about his death.”
Rose was clearly startled. “Good heavens!” She sat down rather suddenly, disregarding the crumpling of her skirt, and motioned for Hester to sit also. “That sounds so terribly reasonable, doesn’t it? But it’s not true!”
Hester recounted what Monk had told her the previous evening—at least regarding the cook’s opinion of Mary, though not yet about the letter.
“That is the Mary I know,” Rose agreed quickly. She leaned forward.
“She was not a sentimental sort of person, Mrs. Monk. She was very practical and quite able to stand up to a truth she did not wish to hear, if it was indeed the truth. I don’t know where to begin, but if you have any idea at all, please let us do something to establish her innocence.”
“Innocence…?”
“Of having killed herself!” Rose said quickly, the emotion now clear in her face, her eyes very bright as though on the brink of tears. “And, if the account is true—God forgive me—innocent of having taken Toby Argyll with her. That is a terrible thing to think of anyone, and I refuse to let it be said by default, because it would be easier for us all to pretend it was over.”
Hester was suddenly heartened. “What are the alternatives?” she asked. “What did happen? How can we demonstrate it so it cannot be denied?”
“Oh, dear!” Rose sat bolt upright. “I see what you mean. If it was not suicide, then it was an accident, or it was murder. That is a very dreadful thought.”
“It seems to me to be inescapable,” Hester pointed out.
The door opened and Morgan Applegate came in. His eyes went immediately to his wife, then to Hester. He was polite and, to judge from the expression on his face, pleased to see her. However, there was something faintly protective in the way he went to Rose and remained standing by her chair, as if, without even giving it a thought, he would make certain Hester did not somehow distress or disturb her.
“How are you, Mrs. Monk?” he said agreeably. “Has there been progress so soon?”
Rose swung around to look at him. “In essence there has, Morgan,” she replied. “We came face-to-face with irrefutable logic, and we must go forward. Actually, Mr. Monk allowed the possibility of accident, but I do not. Two such accidents—it is absurd. Either Mr. Havilland and Mary both took their own lives, or Toby Argyll tried to kill Mary and fell in himself.”
“Rose…,” he started to say, his face now heavy with concern.
“Oh, it’s inescapable,” she said, brushing aside his interruption, and turned again to Hester. “The question is: Who killed Mary? And it must be whoever killed James Havilland.”
“Your logic is at fault, my dear,” Applegate said gently, but his voice was quite firm. “According to the police, there was no one involved in poor Mary’s death apart from Toby Argyll, and he, poor man, went off the bridge with her. If he was responsible, then he has already paid the ultimate price.”
Rose looked at him patiently. “You have missed the point, Morgan. I am not concerned with trying to have someone pay! I wish to clear Mary of the sin of suicide, and of Toby’s death also, if any might suppose she meant to pull him over. And I want to vindicate her father as well, which is what she wanted above all things.”
“But—” he started.
“And possibly even more important,” she went on, as if he had not spoken, “I want to show that they were both right in their fear of some terrible accident,